Epicurious Recipe App – A Recipe For Success

Need to cook a quick romantic dinner for your date? Looking for a quick and healthy snack for your kids? Or are you finally ready to give home cooking a chance after years of ordering Chinese food? Epicurious is a cooking app that includes recipes for both cooking dummies and lovers of exquisite cuisine. With the Android app version of the beloved Epicurious.com online cook book, you have the perfect tool for healthy and efficient cooking .

Rating

Features & Use

Epicurious is an impressive database for all sorts of cooking recipes. In order to find what you’re looking for, the main menu is made up of 11 categories for easy reference. There’s really something for everyone. If you’ve never held a frying pan in your hand, refer to the “I Can Barely Cook” category and choose from over 8,000 quick and easy recipes! Are your kids picky eaters? No worries! Just head on over to “Dishes Kids Love” for some great ideas.

Like I said, Epicurious is filled with thousands upon thousands of tasty dishes for every kind of occasion. As someone that is constantly on the run in the mornings, I found the “Fast Breakfasts” section particularly intriguing. I went with the breakfast burritos with chorizo and eggs – an amazing way to start off the day. As tasty as the breakfast was, it took a good 25-30 minutes to make, which isn’t my idea of fast. Be warned that some of these categories may be a bit misleading, but all the recipes are definitely worth a try.

Aside from browsing for recipes through the different categories, the Epicurious Recipe App also lets you search for food to fit your taste. You can search based on:

Ingredients

Meal/Course

Cuisine (ranging from American to Vietnamese)

Dietary Consideration (Vegan, Low Fat, Healthy, Low Cal, Kosher etc.)

Dish Type

Season or Occasion (including all the major holidays)

This is hands-down the most comprehensive recipe search I’ve ever seen. In the mood for a low carb Asian lunch? Or are you feeling more like a French vegan hors d’oeuvre? Try out all sorts of whacky combinations and see what Epicurious can come up with.

Every recipe comes with a set of precise instructions on how to prepare the dish. Some recipes are more straight-forward than others depending on the person that wrote it (most of the recipes are user-generated). In addition, you’ll find a photo and reviews from other users for most recipes. Based on the picture and other people’s experiences of cooking the dish, you can determine whether you’d like to take a shot at it.

Now here comes the best part: once you’ve found a recipe you like just click the small + symbol next to the name and all the ingredients get automatically added to an integrated shopping list. Yeah, that’s right Epicurious also doubles as nifty shopping list app! This way you know exactly what to buy and there’s no chance of you getting the wrong stuff. Just check off the items on your shopping list as you stroll through the supermarket in preparation for your next meal.

Bottom Line: In my mind, Epicurious is the best cooking app for Android. Period. Although I never used the website, the app version is spectacular and definitely a must-have for people that love to cook (or are trying to learn how to start). With its comprehensive search feature, you’ll be able to find even the most obscure culinary gem – whether it’s a tasty PBJ sandwich or an exquisite salmon filet.

Oh and don’t forget: Epicurious has cocktail and drink recipes, as well.

Screen & Controls

Everything is accessible directly from the main menu where you’ll find a recipe search bar and 11 recipe categories. At the bottom of the screen, you can check out your favorites and shopping lists. The shopping list is well-organized according to ingredient and you can mark off each item like you would on a regular checklist.

The design is neat and you can swipe through all the recipes – making the experience similar to flipping the pages of a real cook book.

Epicurious Recipe App also comes with a great Recipe of the Day widget with great cooking suggestions that can be placed directly on your home screen.

Speed & Stability

Both the widget and the app load and open very quickly. All the buttons and menus are very responsive. The Epicurious Recipe App did crash twice while I used it, but I think it had less to do with the app itself and more to do with the fact that I was running a billion different processes simultaneously on my phone.

Price/Performance Ratio

Epicurious Recipe App is available for free from the Google Market. There are no ads, but you'll need an internet connection to open the recipes. Fortunately, recipes added to your Favorites can be accessed offline as they are storted on your SD card.